More murders are committed at 92 degrees Fahrenheit than at any other temperature. (It Came From Outer Space).
Ants can grow to six feet in length (Them!)
Beware radiation clouds! They make you shrink. (The Incredible Shrinking Man)
Beware of spiders (The Incredible Shrinking Man, Tarantula).
Monsters created from the effects of radiation can only be conquered by one of the “elements” (earth, air, fire or water). Monsters from outer space can only be conquered by microbes to which we developed immunity eons ago.
A surprising number of alien cultures are composed of dumb, but beautiful, women.
It’s probably a bad idea to make out in the car.
The best way to go about excavating a potential alien artifact stuck in the arctic ice is to use Air Force goons. And snappy dialogue. And thermite. (Fucking thermite??) (The Thing From Another World)
When you are ordered not to thaw the unknown alien life form under any circumstances, your best bet is to put a blanket over the ice. Also, if it’s an electric blanket, for God’s sake, make sure it’s plugged in! (The Thing from Another World)
Dracula is not just thwarted by crucifixes. Anything that can vaguely be considered to be in the shape of a cross–like two candlesticks held together at an angle–will scare the crap out of him. (The Horror of Dracula)
I love Hammer Horror, but this is just cheating. I mean, what happens when Dracula has to pass by a picket fence? Can he cope with window frames?
If you step into the sunlight while walking on the lunar surface, you will instantly be incinerated.
Quite often sending in the Army will fix many problems. If not, it might take a little while, but our Best and Brightest can almost always come up with a gadget that’ll do the trick. Any truly global problem is best handled by the U.N.
a mere six feet? I think you were watching the 1970s monster film Empire of the Ants. In Them! the ants stoof more than six feet at the shoulder. Or would, if ants had shoulders.
Seriously, go back and watch the film again. Those ants were freakin’ huge.
Other things you can learn:
1.) If you bury a murderer near a tree, with the proper incantations, his soul will be re-incarnated in the tree and he can come back after you (From Hell it Came).
2.) Evil Fungus in a cave looks like Soap Bubbles (The Unknown Terror)
3.) Giant Indestructible Birds from Other Dimensions look REALLY goofy. (The Giant Claw)
4.) The Growth of Giant Amoebas living in Mayan Wells can be accelerated by Comets (Caltiki, The Immortal Monster)
5.) Other Planets are inhabited by gaggles of beautiful, skimpily-dressed women without men who speak perfect English (Fire Maidens from Outer Space, Queen of Outer Space, Abbott and Costeelo go to Mars, and others)
6.) The Square-Cube law doesn’t REALLY hold. It’s one of those myths. So giant creatures of any kind are OK. So are really teeny creatures, too. Them!, Tarantula, The Blackl Scorpion, Beginning of the End, Killers from Space, The Giant Gila Monster, The Monster that Challenged the World, and WAYYYY too many others to list.)
7.) If it’s a Crazy Idea, and You Only Have One Shot, it’ll work. (Too many to mention)
8.) You don’t want to be the only Night Watchman at a museum or site where anything WEIRD has happened.
9.) The police will NEVER believe your crazy story until one of them gets eaten.
10.) If you’re the Beautiful young scientist/scientist’s daughter/reporter/whatever, you have a charmed life, and will survive a neare-attack by the Creature(s) (Unless, as noted above, you’ve been Making Out. Then, you’re Toast.)
11.) Alien Invaders usually have Really Bad Special Effects. (Except in Earth Vs. the Flying Saucers. They had cool effects.)
12.) If you’re Japanese, your lip movements won’t match your words if you try to speak English.
13.) Blobs are always evil, and will try to ingest you (The Blob (of course!), H-men, Angry Red Planet, Caltiki, the Immortal Monster, X-the Unknown, and others.)
Dames basically get in the way (almost every 1950s Sci-Fi movie except The Thing From Another World.)
Alien Spacecraft look like hubcaps or paper plates spray painted silver, hanging from monofilament.
All elderly, white-haired scientists have really hot, available daughters.
Bullets are less accurate if you thrust the revolver forward each time you fire.
Yes, but that’s probably still true today.
You can’t always trust your parents (Invaders from Mars)
Roddy
I learned almost too late that man is a feeling creature.
(To paraphrase It Conquered the World.)
As we learned in FRIGHT NIGHT, the faith of the cross-wielder helps. And Van Helsing had faith by the bucketload. Hell, in BRIDES OF DRACULA, he cured his own vampire bite with by searing it with his coal-heated silver cross & holy water.
An actual cross set up by believers, no matter how long ago, also has power.
If you’re a woman menaced by an alien, standing around and screaming until a big strong man comes to rescue you is your only hope. Also, try not to get caught in a scenario where you and a man are being chased through the woods by aliens/monsters. You will be the one who trips. That will because you are wearing heels, something you always do.
If you’re a little kid and afraid of monsters, empty your bladder before watching the movie.
Experiments to better mankind always turn into disasters.
Isolated, lone scientists can achieve miracles that the Department of Defense can’t.
“He tampered in God’s domain” is a perfectly reasonable explanation for why a mad scientist’s work turns out badly.
All advanced technology involves Jacob’s ladders at some point.
** minor hijack **
Interestingly, in the sci-fi novel Blindsight vampires turn out to have been a hominid species that preyed upon humans, but whose visual cortex was wired in a way that two straight lines at right angles caused epileptic fits in them. So they went extinct with the rise of civilization and such things as window frames.
** minor hijack **
Klaatu Baruda Nikto.